Working Poor Struggle

Working poor struggles and large families. Think about your neighbors, coworkers, and your friends. The fears that are faced daily ..

13. Mom can I have 3 dollars for a school fair/game? The biggest I’m going to have to say no….die as a parent in shame question

12. The car maintenance struggle: If you are poor and lucky enough to own a vehicle you know this struggle well. You pray that nothing happens to your vehicle. For instance, new tires could easily eat up an entire month of grocery money.

11. The dental struggle: You wake up one morning with a throbbing, swollen face and immediately are faced with horror that you have to go to the dentist. Holy crap! You don’t have dental insurance! Dentists are expensive. A root canal and crown can easily run $2,000. So what do you do? You hope that the leftover amoxicillin in your medicine cabinet will do the job until you save enough to have that tooth pulled. But what about the pain?!

10. The sick kid struggle: Your kid gets sick in the middle of the week and you don’t even have $4 to your name. You can’t afford any Children’s Motrin or any other store-bought medicine. you know it’s going to be a big huge circle of sickness. Time to bust out that home remedy book! Don’t even start on childcare costs.

9. The medical emergency struggle: Not only do you have a medical bill that would make Jesus weep, but now you’ve missed time at work and your employer isn’t paying you for that. There’s nothing worse than focusing on the cost of a hospital visit and missed time at work while also worrying if your or your child will heal.

8. The grocery struggle: Maybe you don’t even qualify for assistance, what now? Now you get to sit down and try to figure out how you can make $30 buy food for the week.

7. The bill paying struggle: Which final notice should you pay first? Water or electric.

6. The overdraft fee struggle: You accidentally spent one dollar more than you had in the bank and now you have an overdraft fee. Bank overdraft fees are an awesome way to really stick it to people who are struggling to stay afloat.

5. The school clothes struggle: Winter is here and your kid has grown out of all of their winter clothes, oh joy!

4. The school supplies struggle: Next to Christmas and birthdays this is the single most dreaded time of the year. For one child, school supplies can easily run between $40-$80.

3. The birthday struggle: Yay, it’s time to celebrate your child’s entrance to the world! How exciting!

2. The Christmas struggle: It’s the most wonderful time of year, right? WRONG! Every parent wants to make the holidays special for their child. It’s magical for them, but not so much for parents who do not have any money. This is the worst time of year. The desire to make your children happy is what puts you in danger of being trampled on Black Friday. It’s what causes your bills to pile up or a credit card to be maxed out.

And finally…

1. The hygiene products struggle: This is probably the most degrading of all the struggles. You’ve run out of shampoo, toothpaste, toilet paper, deodorant, tampons (if you’re a woman), razors, etc. and you have no money to buy more.

By the way, these are not problems exclusively faced by people below the poverty line. There are millions of Americans who live just at, or slightly above, the poverty line and they struggle too — maybe even more since this group makes “too much” to qualify for any assistance, but not enough to live comfortably, or even afford the necessities. I feel your pain, too.